All About Growing Beets

Enlarge Image Image Gallery Red table beets are only the tip of the beet iceberg: Mangel beets can be used as livestock fodder, storage beets can be eaten all winter, and white or golden beets make a stunning edible display when mixed in a beet salad. ILLUSTRATION: KEITH WARD

Growing beets will give you delicious, colorful roots and nutritious greens. Closely related to spinach and chard, and once called “blood turnips” because of their bright red juice, beets also can be golden, white or striped. If you keep livestock, you can grow special varieties of forage or mangel beets to feed to your animals in winter.

Types to Try

Red table beets produce edible greens in 35 days, followed by round or cylindrical roots a month later. Leaves from most red beets have red stems and leaf veins similar to red-leafed chard varieties.

White, orange and golden beets are prized for their mild, nutty flavor. Because they don’t bleed red juice, these beets are best for roasting with other vegetables.

Storage beets are table beet varieties that excel when grown for fall harvest followed by winter storage in your refrigerator or root cellar.

Mangel beets, often called forage beets or mangel-wurzel beets, grow huge roots weighing from 5 to 20 pounds each that can be used as livestock fodder in winter.

For more detailed information on each type of beet and our list of recommended varieties, see our Beets at a Glance chart. 

When to Plant

Begin planting beet seeds directly in the garden one month before your last spring frost date, followed by a second planting two to three weeks later. Beet seeds can germinate in cool soil, but they sprout best when soil temperatures are above 50 degrees Fahrenheit.

Start planting beets for fall harvest 10 to 12 weeks before your expected first fall frost. (Learn more about your region’s planting dates by using our What to Plant Now pages.)

Planting Beets

Cultivate the planting site and mix in a 1-inch layer of cured compost and a standard application of organic fertilizer. As long as your soil is not alkaline, you can also mix in a sprinkling of wood ashes for additional potassium, which will support more vigorous beet growth. All beets grow best in fertile soil with a pH between 6.2 and 7.0. Water the prepared bed, and plant beet seeds half an inch deep and 2 inches apart, in rows spaced 12 inches apart.

Beet seeds germinate in five to 10 days if kept constantly moist. Repeated watering can cause some soils to crust on the surface, which can inhibit the emergence of seedlings. Cover seeded rows with boards or burlap for a few days after planting to reduce surface crusting. This technique is also useful when planting beets for fall harvest in warm summer soil. Just be sure to remove the covers as soon as the beet seedlings break the surface.